Like this:

A few years back I watched the movie The Bucket List starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman. Although very Hollywood’y it’s a beautiful movie – and if you let it, very inspiring.
A couple of weeks ago I watched it again and afterwards I decided “hey, I should do my bucket list!”. Making that decision, an inner clarification process was started. Desires and ambitions all rose to the surface and went through a selection; I realised that not everything I wish to do in life belongs on the actual bucket list. There’s a lot of things I would love to do, places to go, goals to achieve – but somehow, what goes on the list should be more important. Initially I would just scribble down everything that came to mind but taking each thing, looking at it, feeling it, I would end up erasing most again. It’s not enough to want it. I need to feel it in my heart.

Gradually the list became longer and as I’m writing there’s 11 items on it. 2 of them are very specific wishes; to attend the New Year Concert in Vienna and to tango in Buenos Aires. The rest is a mix of places, skills and events.

The clarity and satisfaction of going through this process then spread; discussing the whole thing with my roommate made her realise that what would be on the top of her list is to run a marathon. She has been considering it for years but never committed to it. Now realising exactly how important it is, she made the decision to go for it. Just 20 minutes later she comes out of her room, clearly very emotional and with an expression somewhere between joy and fear and tells me “I just signed up for the marathon!”

Updating your direction is such a life affirming gift for yourself. It will give you fresh motivation and reconnect you with your deeper values. And it doesn’t really matter if you do the bucket list or the vision board or something else (I say do all of it!) but it matters that you make time to listen to your soul.

Suddenly 7 weeks seem like a second and there’s no way I’m going to experience more than a fraction of what this amazing country has to offer. Luckily I really enjoy researching – it’s when it comes to actually chosing the problems start.

What was I thinking?! I need at least a year for this trip!

Btw I just realized today that I’m going to miss out of H.H Dalai Lama speaking in Dharamsala. Apparently he will do so on March 8th and that day I will have to fly out of Delhi, which means I should make sure to be there the day before, just in case of unforseen stuff.. So I will miss the lama by one day. Bummer. I guess I’m sticking to the original plan, in which the lama and I will coincidentally bump into each other. You know, just hanging out, no big deal.

Like this:

Okay, so I created a blog – and then I did absolutely nothing further with it.

Actually, since I made that first (yes, and only) post I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want with this blog. From it. What are my intentions and also, what are my options. I have not reached any conclusion yet and that may seem rather lazy of me – or at least not very serious.
But to my own defense, only two days after creating this blog something potentially life changing happened.

Unwinding to a few weeks back; I was dealing with one of those existential crisis that are so fun, very much aware that the way I had organized my life, was no longer satisfying. In all honesty, organizing my life has always been a challenge as I simply fail to understand how everyone else are able to accept that 9-5 work structure but I still haven’t managed to succeed in any alternative. Anyways, no need to dwell on my issues, I will find a solution, it’s a question of simple planning. Right? It was just to say that a crisis was going on. At the same time as my unravelling (already I’m sick of the word ‘crisis’ – it’s hereby forbidden) I was trying to plan a trip to Hawaii. I had lived there for 6 months in 2010 and had been wanting to return pretty much from the day I set foot back in my own country. But for numerous reasons, it hadn’t been possible (or not prioritized properly) and so now I was determined to finally make it happen. It seemed I was working uphill though and more and more I got the feeling that I had missed my window. What a dreadful feeling.

Now, something unexpected was going on. While Hawaii slowly got blurrier, another country stepped into focus. It started as a discreet wave in the periphery of my attention. You know, like a person who wants to get in contact with you but isn’t comfortable with just shouting your name across the street. A discreet but persistent wave. “Hi…” “Hello..?” It’s not that I didn’t notice it. It’s more that I’m used to my mind wandering, picking up everything on the way, forming ideas, creating magical possibilities all over the place – and that’s great most of the time but in my current situation I was trying to put everything down, to simplify. So I ignored India. “Yes, you look amazing and under different circumstances we could have a lot of fun but right now I’m trying to be serious. I have issues I need to solve and I don’t have time to play with you. Sorry.”

Over the next couple of days India stepped up its game. I was contacted by people from India who wanted to meet (being contacted by strangers is not necessarily a weird thing since I’m a member of CouchSurfing (look it up, I’m in the middle of my story here)) and was confronted with both topics in the media as well as random conversations, all including India one way or another. I then started paying attention.

The complete stranger that I mentioned in my first post, was a lovely Canadian CouchSurfer that I was hosting. Her name is Jenna. From the time I read her first email, I knew that of course we had to meet. From the time she stepped foot in my apartment, she was a great friend. And only a few hours later and a couple of simple and well-chosen questions from Jenna, India had stepped right in front of me, no longer possible to ignore. What a surprise.

So now, all caught up to present time, I’m going to India. Leaving in less than three weeks for seven weeks of travelling alone. Excited and scared all at the same time, I’m researching as much as possible – so no wonder I haven’t had time to blog. But I didn’t want to let my blog wither in its beginning phase, it would be too sad.

So figuring out intention and direction and all that will have to wait a bit more – I guess reality took a turn and took over and made me participate instead of ponder. Not a bad thing.

Like this:

Actually, I have kept one before but that was because I was living abroad and it was an ideal way to share my life with family and friends at home. Surprisingly it turned out to be fun. I really liked it. The problem is that I never really found it to be an acceptable activity. I couldn’t take it seriously, not in the real everyday world. And so once I was home again, the purpose of the blog was no longer there and I never considered continuing it. Until yesterday.

Well to be honest, for the past month or so I have been experiencing a need to pick up writing again, to create an outlet, to go into that flow of expression. I would love to write a book and I have a billion ideas but I still don’t have the structural overview that I feel writing a book would demand and I have a feeling that I don’t have the discipline either. Yet. So I’ve briefly considered a blog but still couldn’t wrap my head around it. Blogs are for other people, not me. Definitely not me.

Then yesterday, a complete stranger is sitting in my couch, we’re talking and having fun – and then that something happens. You know, that something that happens when you and the person you’re with is catching the same frequency, inspiration awakes and creativity rises to a higher level. And reality change. Well that is what happened. Things fell into place and my path, which had been pretty blurry became quite clear again. I wasn’t expecting a blog to appear as the next step on my path but suddenly it was there right in front of me, all set up and ready to go and I found no acceptable reason for not taking that step. So I started a blog.

I guess that’s how it is – and how it should be. We have thoughts, feelings, perspectives, opinions and they may be true and they may be important. And then they change. They become something else. Hopefully something better, something bigger, more evolved, closer to the true truth about who we are and who we want to be.

I don’t know, I can’t be sure. But I know that is the way I want to live. I want to let reality change.